Buridan and Skepticism

• Author(s) / Creator(s)

  • Zupko, Jack

• Despite John Buridan's reputation as the foremost Parisian philosopher of the fourteenth century and the predominant role played by his teachings in European universities until well into the sixteenth century,' our understanding of his thought in a number of areas remains sketchy. Epistemology is a case in point. Only a handful of studies have touched on this topic over the past five decades, and most of these have been interested not in explaining Buridan's epistemology per se, but in sorting out the complex relationship between Buridan's remarks on knowledge and a number of skeptical propositions associated with Nicholas of Autrecourt. Because I feel that this relationship has never been properly understood, and that Buridan's reply to Nicholas is as good a place as any to begin discussing his epistemology, the present study will likewise be addressed to this issue. But it should serve as well to illustrate Buridan's general position on the question of human knowledge, since, as we shall see below, his reply to Nicholas makes no sense unless certain doctrines implicit in his brief remarks are made explicit.

• Date created

  1993

• Subjects / Keywords

  • Epistemology
  • Human knowledge
  • Philosophy
  • Buridan, John

• Type of Item

  Article (Published)

• DOI

  https://doi.org/10.7939/R3H41K21P

• License

  © 1993 Johns Hopkins University Press. This version of this article is open access and can be downloaded and shared. The original author(s) and source must be cited.